Montreal’s fire department planning to diversify

It’s not considered a glamorous job but it can be very rewarding. Firefighting is not for the faint of heart. But in Montreal, it’s also a profession that is not for visible minorities or women.

Staff numbers in the department hardly reflect the city’s demographics. There are 2,360 members on the force. Only 29 (1.2 per cent) are female.

Twenty-four members (representing 1 per cent) are visible minorities.

And there are only five aboriginal firefighters — making up 0.2 per cent of the overall force.

The department wants to change these figures and fast. By 2021, officials plan to double those numbers. And by 2025, triple them.

“This career path does not have a very high value compared to others and we really want to try and change in different cultural communities,” Richard Liebmann, the fire department’s deputy director told reporters at city hall on Tuesday.

Liebmann says the department will go on a recruitment campaign at firefighting training schools and to market the career of a firefighter to different cultural communities.

“Well, we really want to demystify the requirements of the job and we have to work closely with cultural communities to explain what the job is all about, he said.

In Toronto, nine per cent of the department’s force is women.

“We’re behind Toronto in a lot of things in municipal governance,” Fo Niemi, a race relations advocate pushing for more visible minorities in local government, told Global News.

He’s encouraged by the efforts being made by the Montreal fire department, arguing it’s important to reach out to minorities and explain to them the benefits of working as a first responder or firefighter.

“Showing an image, saying that you can be of any background but you can succeed, have a job and you can move up to become, among others things, a first responder,” Niemi said.

The fire department will have to submit reports every six months to the Montreal Public Security Commission illustrating its performance.